Chris Reed has a post up [...] on his UT blog discussing the continuing "media error-a-thon" in regards to classifying those without health care in the United States. His complaint is that there are not 47 million Americans without health insurance. Rather, there are 47 million people in America without health insurance. His gripe so much as I understand it is that immigrants, legal or otherwise, shouldn't be part of the health care discussion in the first place and that including them improperly legitimizes these people as Americans and artificially inflates the health care problems faced in this country.
Well, Chris Reed is striking back at us... WITH EVEN MORE LAMENESS, AND STILL NOT GETTING THE POINT!! You just have to see it to believe it, so follow me down below for more...
(Cross-posted at Calitics)
So how does Chris Reed respond to Lucas' valid point about the the practical benefits of providing everyone with proper health care? Well, here 'ya go:
... [T]o my amazement and amusement, my gripe over the national media's inability to correctly state that there are about 47 million people in the U.S. over any 12-month span without health insurance as opposed to 47 million Americans -- U.S. citizens -- was the target of ire at Calitics, a liberal California Web site with a growing audience. My sin: I miss the whole point of the health insurance debate. I'm trying to minimize the problem and dehumanize the non-citizens included in that 47 million figure. I'm "splitting hairs."
And oh yes, we are also being quite deceitful!! How dare us!
I have to offer this comparison, just because I know it will set the Calitics set off:
Suppose the Bush White House had people who really, really, really sincerely believed Saddam was evil and had to go for the good of the world: Under the same standard by which Calitics folks think it is OK to distort our health insurance woes, why shouldn't the Bush White House exaggerate about WMDs?
OH... MY... F***ING... GAWD! Is this the best that he has? If so, then Chris Reed still doesn't get it. We are not being deceitful about the 47 million people in the United States without health care. No, we are simply trying to say that any truly comprehensive health care solution needs to cover ALL 47 MILLION PEOPLE in this nation!
Again, germs and viruses don't check our green cards. And no, injuries do not care about our immigration status. Everyone gets sick, and everyone hurts. Plain and simple.
And once again, more sick people in our nation harms our nation's overall health. It hurts our economic productivity. It keeps kids out of school. And oh yes, it adds to ALL OF OUR HEALTH CARE COSTS when people who don't have adequate health care get sick and/or injured.
We are not being "deceitful" by talking about ALL 47 MILLION PEOPLE WITHOUT HEALTH CARE. If anything, we're trying to add some more honesty into the discussion by talking about everyone and not playing semantics games. If Chris Reed really wants to compare someone's deceit on health care to Bush's deceit on Iraq, then he can look no further than... BUSH! And oh yeah, how's that plan to provide health care for all our kids?
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